


Insoluble

by longwhitecoats



Category: Ghostbusters (Movies)
Genre: Asexual Character, Bisexual Character, Friendship is Magic, Gen, Ghostbusting is magic, Yuletide Treat, actually Ghostbusting is very serious science
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-24
Updated: 2015-12-24
Packaged: 2018-05-09 01:34:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5520479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/longwhitecoats/pseuds/longwhitecoats
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the prompt: "If there is any way you could write an asexual Egon, perhaps dealing with the overly sexual Peter, I would love you forever and ever."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Insoluble

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ladygray99](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladygray99/gifts).



The first time anybody brought it to Egon’s attention was in the ninth grade, when he was spending his lunch outside playing speed chess with himself. Sukhi Sandhu was watching him, tilting her head from side to side, the collar of her coat popped up around her turban to keep her cheeks warm. Egon’s breath steamed in the cold Newark air.

“You always make the same moves at the beginning,” Sukhi said at last. “How can the midgame be different?”

“Combinatorics,” Egon answered, not looking up. “The number of possible moves in the midgame is not significantly reduced by practicing the same opening.” Then he paused. “Not proportionately, that is. Statistically, it may be significant. I haven’t checked.”

“Mmm,” Sukhi said. “I guess I meant, are you really gonna get better if you practice the same thing over and over?”

Egon moved his bishop, hit the clock, and swiveled the board. He smiled. Sukhi was much more competitive than he was—number one in track and field, top of their advanced chemistry _and_ advanced biology classes, and she beat him most times they played a game of anything. She had a thirst for winning.

“I’m not in it for the same things you are, I guess,” he said. “I just like thinking about the problem.”

They sat still for the next five minutes, and Egon felt Sukhi’s eyes more keenly on the board. She’d already solved the problem, he thought; but she was trying to solve the problem of beating _his_ moves. Egon wanted to know what the _best_ next move was, regardless of who his opponent happened to be.

While they were staring at the board together, Desirée Caldwell walked by and waved. “Hiiiii, Egon,” she said, giggling. Egon waved back, not sure what to do with his face.

Sukhi made a thoughtful noise. “She likes you a lot, y’know. You could date her if you wanted.”

Egon looked up in surprise, and the clock went off: five minutes up. He banged on it until it stopped. “I, uh. Okay? What? You mean Desirée?”

“Yeah,” Sukhi laughed. “She only comes outside when it’s this cold to check up on you.” Then her mouth twisted up. “I kinda think Benji does too.”

They both looked toward the fence, where cool Benji leaned in his denim jacket, smoking furtively. He grinned at Egon when he noticed them looking. Egon smiled awkwardly back. Then he looked plaintively at Sukhi.

“Am I supposed to do something about this?” he said, worried. This seemed like an awful lot of extra things to worry about at lunch.

But Sukhi, ever the pragmatist, just shrugged. “Nah. Not if you don’t wanna. I mean, do you _like_ girls, dude? For that matter, do you like boys?” She said it lightly, as if to say that it didn’t make a difference to her either way.

Egon thought about it. “I like chess,” he said, and reset the clock.

*

It didn’t come up again until Venkman, because everything came up around Venkman. He was like a human-sized homing beacon for awkwardness. If there was something you were embarrassed to talk about, he would discover it and mention it casually during a business meeting. Peter Venkman was pretty much a tool. But he was also exceptional at keeping his head even when Egon miscalculated the triangulation on their proton streams, or when Ray accidentally exploded a container by overloading the plasma-neutralization circuits, and that meant he was a good Ghostbuster. He even talked Winston down after a particularly scary episode when Winston’s ghost trap malfunctioned.

So long as they were busting ghosts, having Venkman around was fine.

When they weren’t, Egon wished he could put _Venkman_ in a ghost trap.

“Hey Egon, what’s happening,” Venkman said, sneaking up behind Egon and clapping him on the back. “Got some good-lookin’ goo right there. Is that an experiment or lunch? Has Ray been cooking again?”

Egon sighed, wishing he could take his hands out of the chemical safety gloves long enough to pinch the bridge of his nose. “It’s an unstable form of ectoplasm which I’m attempting to stabilize chemically instead of through molecular charge, Peter, and I’d appreciate a little personal space. This is a highly delicate procedure. Even the slightest mismeasurement could cause an extreme reaction.” Which was mostly true, even if the “extreme reaction” in question would just be Egon yelling a lot.

It had the desired effect. Venkman put up his hands in surrender. “Okay. Got it. No touching the goop. Same thing the boys always tell me.” He winked, just to underscore the innuendo, and Egon rolled his eyes.

“Not everything is about sex, Venkman,” he muttered.

He heard Venkman sigh.

“That’s the tragedy of human existence, Egon,” he said, and wandered off to bother someone else.

*

“You can just _tell_ him if it makes you uncomfortable,” Ray said a few weeks later. He and Winston were eating pizza outside in Central Park, keeping Egon company while he finished up some P.K.E. readings on the lake. “Peter doesn’t mean to upset you.”

“Are you kidding?” Winston said, wiping his chin. “Of course he does. That’s why Peter does everything. I think he can’t go to sleep until he’s gotten a rise out of somebody.” Egon and Ray both looked at Winston, raising their eyebrows at the unfortunate choice of words. Winston looked sheepish. “Sorry.”

Ray took a slug of cream soda. “What I mean is, he’s not hitting on you. Not that you aren’t worth hitting on. You’re a very attractive man, Egon.”

“Likewise, Ray,” Egon called, pulling his submersible P.K.E. reader out of the water.

Winston rolled his eyes. “Look, while I’m glad we’re all such a bunch of handsome guys,” he said, “I’m not sure how this solves the problem.”

Egon wiped off the plate covering the gauge, which read 366.75. He’d been right: abnormally high psychokinetic energy. They were going to have to let the city know.

Behind him, Ray sang a soft ditty. “How do you solve a problem like a Venkman?”

“People aren’t really problems to be solved, Ray,” Egon said. “Let’s take this back to the station.”

*

While Egon was working late that night, distilling some ectoplasm just to see if it had different properties when purified, he heard someone slide down the pole behind him. Then he smelled... french fries?

“I was gonna cook, but then I found this great fry place down the block,” Venkman said. “Want some?”

“Thanks, Peter,” Egon said, surprised.

“Winston and Ray gave me a talking-to,” Peter said. “I think the message was, I should stop beating around the bush.”

“O-kay,” Egon said slowly. “I’m assuming this isn’t about the P.K.E. readings from Central Park.”

“No, although those were very sexy,” Peter said. “You know I love that fine calibration.”

Egon willed himself not to roll his eyes. “What did you want to tell me, Peter?”

“Well,” Peter said, casually stuffing french fries in his mouth, “I was wondering if you liked guys.”

Oh. It had been a while since Egon had this problem. With all the fuss about Dana, Egon hadn’t thought—but then, who knew, with Venkman. He liked to torment everybody; it made sense that he’d like to sleep with everybody, too.

“I mean, I guess I’m curious whether you like ladies, too,” Peter said. “But only in a purely scientific sense. The first question is more personally relevant.” And he did that bashful smile of his, which was meant to look ironic, but was actually a perfectly genuine expression of hopefulness.

Egon’s mouth turned up at one corner. Direct actually was better, he thought. Ray was right. “You want to know if I like men or women,” he said.

“Yeah,” Peter said.

Egon put a hand on Peter’s shoulder and looked him in the eyes. He figured if he made it clear that he wasn’t joking, he wouldn’t have to have this conversation again. “I like _science_ ,” he said, as firmly as he could. “I like ghostbusting.”

Peter looked pensive for a moment, and Egon worried about whether he’d gotten the point across; but then Peter shrugged lightly, and said, “Cool,” and that was that. One good thing you could say about Peter: he didn’t like to stress.

“Cool,” Egon said, cautiously pleased. He took his hand away and gestured to his work bench. “Wanna watch me distill some ectoplasm?”

Ordinarily, he thought Peter would probably run swiftly from anything that resembled work or using his brain, but to his surprise, Peter parked himself on a nearby stool and resumed eating french fries. “Egon,” he said, “I would like nothing better.”

“Cool,” Egon said again, and went back to work.


End file.
